These are punctuation essays (unedited) written by students of Doris Middleton, a third grade teacher, and Christina Parker, student teacher, at Thomas Jefferson Elementary School in Turnersville, NJ.

Christina writes, “You have contacted my cooperating teacher, Doris Middleton about punctuation day and her use of teaching punctuation. She was in the local newspaper last year for writing to the troops in Iraq. I recently taught a lesson on punctuation, and took come pictures of us that I thought you might enjoy. I showed the class your website and told our class that we might be able to be on your website because we celebrated punctuation day.”

Punctuation is important because without punctuation a sentence would never end, and it would go on forever and ever. Punctuation makes reading more fun! Punctuation helps to understand a story better and makes reading exciting. On National Punctuation Day our class visited your website, and we also visited a website with punctuation games. One question we had about punctuation was, “How come in Spanish there is punctuation at the beginning and end of a sentence?”

— Nick and AnnaMarie

On National Punctuation Day we learned why punctuation is important and why we use it. Punctuation is important because if you write a letter, the person who reads it can understand what you are saying better. We also learned that we can use punctuation in Spanish and in English. We learned that different kinds of sentences use different punctuation. In third grade we use punctuation when we write our journals and write the time.

— Rebecca, Giovani, and, Kashif

Punctuation helps us to say sentences with expression. On Punctuation Day we wrote all types of sentences using different punctuation. Punctuation is important to understand how to communicate with others. Punctuation makes reading more fun. It’s important to use punctuation when you write.

— Joey, Emily, and Alachia

On Punctuation Day we learned different types of sentences with different types of punctuation. We love to read books with punctuation. Punctuation helps to understand the author’s meaning. Talking marks help us to know when someone is talking. We learned how to use punctuation because it is something we use every day in third grade.

— Janaina, Alexis, Brianna, and Kyle

Punctuation helps to understand our own writing and other’s writing. Punctuation is important because if you write a sentence wrong it can mean something different. On National Punctuation Day Miss Parker read us a book called Eats, Shoots, and Leaves. The pictures showed us how the same sentences can mean different things with different punctuation.